Apparatus having fingered drums for capturing fowl are commonly known in the industry. A good example of the use of fingered drums is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,508,062 issued to Berry et al. Two drums rotated in opposite directions and having flexible fingers thereon engage fowl coming in contact therewith and thrust the fowl rearward.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,900,292 and 5,259,811 also show the use of conveyors for conveying the captured fowl rearward from the rotating drums. More particularly these inventions show the use of a forward conveyor mounted for pivotal movement about a vertical axis in order that the rotating drums may be moved side to side to engage the fowl in a sweeping arc. It is also important to note that a second stationery conveyor is mounted rearward of the pivotal conveyors for receiving the fowl therefrom and conveying same to discharge drums similar in construction to the fingered drums previously described. These discharge drums engage and remove the fowl from the stationery conveyor though it is not clear from the patent how or in what type of compartments the fowl are stored.
The issues of discharge and storage are better addressed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,706,765 and 5,592,902 issued to Horton, which show a complex set of rearward conveyors each pivotally connected to the other for pivotal movement about horizontal axis such that the chain of conveyors can be raised and lowered to position a discharge end of the chain of conveyors proximate selected vertically stacked compartments forming a storage cage. The complex chain of conveyors must be individually maneuvered to position the discharge end in both vertically and horizontally selected points in space, preferably adjacent a compartment opening. It should also be noted that the rear chain of conveyors do not pivot laterally of a vertical plane passing through the longitudinal axis of the Horton inventions. The lack of horizontal lateral rotation limits the potential efficiency of operation by requiring the removal of a full storage cage before the positioning of a second storage cage adjacent the rearward chain of conveyors. What is not provided by the foregoing inventions is an apparatus for capturing and storing fowl that performs those functions set forth above but simplifies and hastens the positioning of the discharge end of a rearward conveyor both vertically and horizontally. The foregoing inventions also do not accommodate the positioning of the discharge end of the rearward conveyor both rearward and laterally of the subject inventions to accommodate access to multiple storage cages positioned about the inventions.